Bridges
by Joodiff
Summary: When Grace returns to the place where she was born, a chance remark from Boyd sets a difficult conversation in motion... Set sometime after "Straw Dog". T-rated for language. Complete. Birthday present for Got Tea and missDuncan. Enjoy!


**DISCLAIMER:** I own nothing.

_Happy Birthday 2019 to Got Tea and missDuncan. xx_

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**Bridges**

by Joodiff

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After forty years, the inscription on the granite headstone is still relatively sharp, and not difficult to read: _Dennis Michael Foley, born 3__rd__ February 1919, died 16__th__ April 1965 aged 46, Beloved Husband and Father_. There's a short biblical verse beneath the dates that Boyd doesn't recognise and barely bothers to read. Hands buried in his coat pockets against the sharp chill of an early spring afternoon, he holds position a respectful distance away, watches with no particular emotion as Grace crouches down to place a small bunch of mixed yellow roses and tulips on the grave. The church and its graveyard lie on what was probably once the outskirts of the village before its boundaries expanded, and it's still quiet and peaceful. Save for the occasional passing car all he can really hear is birdsong. Chaffinches and starlings, mainly, and the occasional mournful hoo-hoo call of a wood pigeon.

It's going to take them a good four hours to drive back to London, he reflects, even if the traffic is good, which it won't be, and they don't stop, which they will. He's not feeling particularly impatient, however. Their official business in Bolton satisfactorily concluded, he was happy to allow a tentative Grace this small indulgence, and he still is. It's not often she gets the chance to return north to the area where she was born and raised, and it's been that way for at least the last couple of decades as she became more and more tied to London by her career and the life she's built surrounding it. It won't matter to anyone if they don't make it back to the capital until late evening.

The late Dennis Foley, by whose grave they are standing, originally hailed from a small town in County Clare, he knows. A professional carpenter, he died in hospital when Grace was just fifteen; died without ever regaining full consciousness a few days after an unfortunate work-related accident on a building site in nearby Manchester. Boyd empathises with her loss – wasn't much older than that when his own father died, half-blind and eaten away by cancer.

"We came to Mass here every Sunday when I was a child," Grace says, straightening up. She half-turns from the grave, surveys the old church and its surroundings with thoughtful serenity. "All the rest of the week, when he wasn't conducting services or ministering to his flock, Father Patrick used to drink in the Rose and Crown with my dad and his cronies."

Boys snorts. "Sounds exactly like Father Joseph."

_Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee._

They have that much in common, he and Grace. Staunch Catholic backgrounds, neither entirely English in origin. Celtic blood, too, he supposes, though it's not something he often thinks about. Irish for her, Scottish for him. He and his late father were both born in London, though, and she… well, she was born right here. Here in this semi-rural village, less than twenty minutes' drive south from the city they drove up from the capital to visit. Sensing a rare opportunity to learn more about her distant past without appearing overly inquisitive, he asks, "Is the house still here? The house where you were born?"

Grace's clear, intelligent gaze settles on him, no less thoughtful than it was before. He expects a simple nod or shake of the head, but instead she says, "Come with me."

Boyd doesn't argue, follows her back to the lychgate beyond which his big silver Lexus is parked, looking out-of-place and ostentatious in the quiet, semi-rural setting. Falling into step with her, he offers, "I was born at King's. Camberwell, you know."

"I do know," she confirms. "I did some of my clinical training at the Maudsley, just across the road."

He thinks he already knew that. Must have read it on her CV when he was officially shuffling candidates for the CCU's Forensic Psychologist post. A forced exercise in futility – he'd never had the slightest intention of employing anyone else, despite strong insistence from his superiors that he consider several other promising candidates. Doctor Grace Foley he had wanted for his brand-new unit, and Doctor Grace Foley he had got. After some fancy footwork, a great deal of smooth-talking, and some extravagant promises he hasn't quite yet managed to make good on, but will do. One day. Realising a response is expected, Boyd gives a noncommittal grunt.

"These houses weren't here when I was a kid," Grace tells him, as they pass a row of boxy, uninspiring semi-detached properties with ridiculously small gardens. 'Seventies vintage, he suspects, probably built a fair few years after what remained of the Foley family unit headed for pastures new. She frowns, gestures at the end pair of houses. "There was a little copse of trees there, and if you went through it, you could walk along a footpath to the stream at the edge of the village. My brothers used to go fishing there."

He's never managed to quite work out exactly how many siblings she has. At least three brothers and a sister. Maybe more. As far as he's ever been able to work out, she's somewhere in the middle, age-wise. Taking his hands out of his coat pockets, he inquires, "Sticklebacks?"

Grace laughs, clearly caught up in happy childhood memories. "Yes."

Boyd nods in approval. "Used to catch those when I was a kid, too. Sometimes in the summer we'd cycle over to Peckham Rye Park and spend the whole day there just messing about by the stream."

She's still smiling. "When you weren't busy playing on bombsites?"

"Goes without saying," he tells her, reflecting idly on a few of his childhood adventures, many of which ended with scraped knees, torn clothes, and a smart clip round the ear from one or other of his long-suffering parents. A car approaches, forcing him up onto the narrow pavement to walk single-file behind her. He can't imagine what it's like to live in a quiet little place like this. A church, a pub, a small village hall, and just a single shop that closes promptly at five except on Wednesdays and Sundays when it doesn't open at all.

"That was the village school, on the corner, there," Grace says, pointing to a single-storey stone building with a sharply-pitched roof and tall windows. Boyd can see ancient rust marks on the stone wall surrounding it where stout iron railings must once have been. Probably removed during the war. It looks as if it's recently renovated and is now a private residence. His companion continues, "The headmistress was a truly terrifying woman called Mrs Asquith. She liked me, though."

Still behind her where she can't see him, he doesn't bother rolling his eyes. "Of _course_ she did."

She laughs again, glances over her shoulder at him. "Not everyone was a little hellion like you, Boyd."

"Actually," he says, with deliberately ponderous dignity, as the car passes them and he steps back into the road to walk next to her again, "I did very well at school."

"Oh, I believe you," is her quick retort. "Just a shame your behaviour didn't match your academic ability, eh?"

"I was bored," he drawls, and it's the absolute truth. Art, sport and a smattering of history had been the only things that had interested him at school. Everything else he'd found mind-numbingly tedious. Too easy or too dull to capture his attention for more than a few scant minutes at a time. Maybe nowadays they'd diagnose him with something-or-other to explain away his inattention and unruliness instead of repeatedly sending him to the headmaster for whatever the modern version of six of the best might be.

"Bone idle, more like," Grace snipes, which Boyd doubts is a professional psychological analysis of his character. However true it might be.

"That, too," he admits with a nonchalant shrug as he continues to saunter next to her. "'Bright, but badly-behaved', that's what most of my school reports said."

"'Could do better'?" she suggests, but there's visible affection in the knowing smile she gives him.

Boyd shrugs again. They are approaching the crossroads on which the former school sits, and he almost smiles as he spots the old-fashioned red telephone box half-buried in the high hedge opposite. One of those quintessentially British symbols that is heading rapidly for complete extinction in the real world. Grace leads him across the road and into a narrow, curved street lined with the kind of small, solid Victorian cottages that were so often built for farm workers and the like in times long gone by. Dark bricks and slate roofs. Functional rather than decorative.

"That was ours," Grace announces, pointing to the furthest end of a terrace of four. "Two up, two down. Tin bath, outside toilet."

Boyd shoots her a sideways glance, wondering whether she's trying to make a point. Decides she's probably not. She's spent enough time in London to know its streets aren't paved with gold, and never were. Knows, too, that's she's not the only one who went to grammar school on a scholarship. Who had to battle every step of the way for the kind of opportunities so easily handed out to those whose families were wealthier and more influential. He grunts, then asks, "How many of you in there?"

"Eight," she says, still gazing at the house where she and her siblings grew up.

"Tight squeeze."

She nods. "It was. I can barely imagine it now."

Their pace slows as they draw closer to the end cottage with its tiny well-kept front garden, and glancing at Grace again, Boyd can't quite interpret her expression. It tugs at his heart a little, the pensive look on her face, plucks at the fierce protective instincts she so often teases him for. He's got it bad, he knows, this… well, whatever it is he feels for her.

_Love_.

Twitching at the unwelcome clarity of the thought, Boyd exhales loudly and sharply. The look she immediately casts in his direction contains both curiosity and resignation. He understands. She thinks he's growing impatient, has lost all interest in indulging her extended trip down memory lane. The need to reassure her is strong and instant, and without thinking about it he reaches for her hand and gives her fingers a gentle squeeze before lacing his own between them. He says, "I bet you ran home from school every bloody day, didn't you? Couldn't wait to get indoors and get started on your homework."

Grace smiles, her mood seeming to lighten. "You know me _far_ too well, Boyd."

"If only that were true," he says with a deliberate, dramatic sigh. A thought occurs to him. "We could knock on the door, you know. Flash our IDs and make up some bullshit story to get the current owners to let us look around."

For a moment she looks half-tempted, but then she shakes her head. "No. Not only would that be _highly_ unethical, it would be… well, disorientating, I suppose. I think I'd rather remember the old place as it was."

Boyd shrugs and releases her hand. "Up to you."

"No," she says, her final word on the subject. A pause, then an almost diffident, "But thank you."

He's not quite the man she thought he was. Not when he's away from work. She told him as much not long after they started… seeing more of each other… a hint of wonder in her voice. Gentler, quieter. Still intense, because that's just who he is, but much more tolerant, much easier to get along with. It didn't offend him then, and it doesn't offend him now as her response makes him recall her hesitant words. Again, he shrugs, dismissive this time. He doesn't say anything because there's nothing _to_ say. That's one difference between them that's never going to change – their disparate need to talk.

"I suppose we should go," she says, her gaze lingering again on the end house.

Putting his hands back into his coat pockets, Boyd grunts, adds a gruff, "Whenever you're ready."

At the far end of the street, a slight woman on a very old bicycle wobbles into view. Even at a distance it's clear to him that the rider, too, is very elderly. Late eighties, maybe, or perhaps even early nineties. Looks a bit like an emaciated scarecrow. Next to him, he hears Grace make a sharp, surprised noise. He's about to make the obvious inquiry when she says, "Miss Carrow."

"Eh?" he offers in return.

"Miss Carrow," Grace repeats, as if he should somehow know. "She used to run the Post Office."

"When?" he asks, watching the oncoming aged cyclist. "Sometime before the Crimean War?"

A brief, baleful look. "Behave yourself."

As the woman draws closer to them, Boyd doesn't revise his estimate of her advanced age. Sharp, lean features, deeply and heavily wrinkled, thin white hair drawn into a tight, aggressive bun. Sensible tweed and incongruous black Wellington boots that look at least a size too large. The inquisitive gaze that rakes across them as she approaches is keen and intelligent, however, suggesting that the old woman is in full command of all her faculties.

Grace greets her with a formal, "Good afternoon, Miss Carrow. Um… it's Grace… Joan's daughter? From across the road…?"

The woman stops her bicycle just a couple of feet away and peers at them both. Her voice is old and scratchy and edged with surprise, but there's clear recognition in the way she responds, "_Grace_…? Good Lord, I would never have recognised you."

"It's been a few years," Grace agrees, smiling. "How are you?"

Tuning out the polite, banal exchange of strained pleasantries, Boyd returns to his idle contemplation of all the things he doesn't know about his companion. Wonders in turn whether there are missing pieces in his own personal history that she speculates about. Must be, he supposes. Broad strokes worked well enough when they were merely colleagues, and even when they started to become good friends, too, but now, now they are… something more… perhaps it's time for them to begin to fill in some of the gaps.

"And this gentleman would be…?" Miss Carrow asks, drawing his attention back to the conversation.

"My…" Grace starts, and then pauses, seeming to struggle to find a suitable descriptive word for him.

"Partner," Boyd supplies for her after a taut moment of silence. Not a word he's overly fond of, but a damn sight better than some of the popular alternatives.

"_Partner_…" Miss Carrow echoes, drawing the word out as if it's something rather unpleasant. She glowers at him with flinty disapproval and there's a glacial note of parochial condemnation in the way she adds, "I see."

The implied censure grates across his nerves, and from the quickly hidden flash of irritation he sees in Grace's blue eyes, he's not alone. It's that, more than anything else, that makes him bristle, the same protective instinct that tugged at him a few minutes before flaring again. He's never been a man to care too much what people think of him, but the pointed, accusatory look aimed at Grace irks him. Keenly. Removing one hand from the coat pocket keeping it warm, he extends it towards the elderly woman. "Peter Boyd. Actually, we _are _married. Just not to each other."

Next to him Grace inhales sharply, and Miss Carrow freezes in the automatic act of reaching out to shake his proffered hand. She really couldn't look any more scandalised if she tried, he reflects. It's going to cost him the quiet, argument-free drive back to London he was hoping for, no doubt about that, but the reaction is still deeply satisfying. He drops his unshaken hand, making a point of it. Before Grace can attempt to smooth the awkward moment over, he adds a contemptuous, "That's the trouble with rural backwaters like this. Far too damn provincial."

Miss Carrow splutters indignantly, fails to find a suitable response, and returns her own hand to the handlebar of her bicycle. To Grace, she says a sharp, stony, "Remember me to your mother. Good day to you."

"Nice to meet you," Boyd calls after her as she wobbles away towards the crossroads

It takes a couple of seconds, but at his side a dangerously quiet voice inquires, "Was that _really_ necessary?"

Still watching the retreating cyclist, he says, "Oh, yes. It did my cold black heart the power of good."

"For God's _sake_, Boyd…"

"She deserved it," he retorts, turning to face her as Miss Carrow disappears from view. "_Thoroughly_ deserved it. Anyway, I only told her the bloody truth."

"That's _not_ the point," Grace snaps at him.

"Why are you bothered?" he asks, genuinely perplexed. "Christ, you said it yourself – you were still a _teenager_ when you left this Godforsaken shithole. Who the hell cares what some disapproving old witch stuck in the nineteen-thirties thinks?"

She shakes her head, but instead of offering an answer she turns on her heel and walks back in the direction they came from, heading towards the old school again. Boyd watches her for a few moments, then ambles after her, making no attempt to catch her up. The rigid set of her shoulders suggests that the matter is a long, long way from over. Not a great surprise. Grace may not have his ferocious, unstable temper, but she's better than him at holding grudges. By _far_. Many's the time he's completely forgotten about some minor difference of opinion only to be caustically reminded of it later when she's started in on him again about the same matter apparently from nowhere. She forgives and forgets, of course, but in her own good time.

Still trailing behind her he wonders – not for the first time – what the hell it is she sees in him. Why, if he infuriates her so much, she let herself be caught when he suddenly took it into his mind to pursue her. Women… they're a bloody mystery, the whole damned lot of them. The gap between them is closing, and Boyd knows he hasn't sped up. Seems she's letting herself be caught again. Literally, this time. As they draw level, he says, "I know a good divorce lawyer, if you're interested."

"Shut up," she tells him.

He doesn't. "It's about time you cut yourself loose from Eric, you know."

"Says the man who can't ever seem to find the time to divorce his _second_ wife."

Boyd shrugs, doesn't bother to argue. It's not a fight he can win, and he knows it. Out of sight, out of mind. Or so he chooses to tell himself. The alternative… hurts too much. Two marriages, and still he goes home to an empty house night after bloody night. Says something about him, he supposes, and whatever it is probably isn't good. Needing to stop the dark chain of thought before it goes any further, he says, "Where's this damn stream of yours, then?"

Grace gives him a closed, thoughtful sort of look, as if she knows exactly where his thoughts are trying to take him. It takes her a moment to say, "There's a stile opposite the church."

"Show me."

"Why?"

He shrugs again. "I like water. It's soothing."

"Soothing," she muses, as if testing the word. "I thought the only thing _you_ found soothing, Boyd, was a large bottle of Scotch."

Refusing to let her goad him, he says, "Humour me."

"I do," Grace retorts. "All the damn time. It's incredibly tiring."

"I was defending your honour, you know," he tries a minute or two later, as they reach the crossroads again and start back towards the church. He doubts she'll believe him, but it's true in its own way.

The response is quick. Too quick. "By accusing me of adultery?"

"Oh, come _on_…" Boyd sighs, digs deep into his limited reserves of patience. "Look, where does the old crone live? I'll go and knock on her bloody door and tell her how that waste of fucking space you married was completely incapable of keeping it in his trousers, if that'll make you feel better."

"_It_ won't, and _you_ won't. How many times have I told you that the bull-in-a-china-shop approach simply doesn't work?"

"And how many times have I proved to you that it _does_? Sometimes."

There's no reply. He didn't really expect one. Friends – and more – they may very well have become, but they still spat and spar the way they always have. Still bring out the worst in each other. The best, too, probably, but not at moments like this. She irritates him, he infuriates her… and yet…

And _yet_ they somehow complement each other perfectly.

As the road bends the Lexus comes back into view, still looking far too belligerent for its surroundings. Boyd has been resisting the urge to look at his watch, but his eyes stray now to the church's clocktower. It's heading for mid-afternoon. Soon, the traffic will start building up on the motorways in earnest. Well, nothing he can do about that now. Grace has drawn a fraction ahead of him again, confident in where she's going, and he lets his gaze turn to her instead. Attractive woman, no doubt about that. Striking-looking rather than conventionally pretty, maybe, but not at all in a negative way. Impressive figure, startling blue eyes, and that smile… He tries to hide it, but there's very little he wouldn't do for that bewitching, promising smile, poor benighted fool that he is.

"I might stay at your place tonight," he says with deliberate nonchalance, as if the idea is no more than a casual flight of fancy. Explanation isn't necessary, but he adds, "We'll be late back, and it'll save me driving halfway across bloody London."

Grace glances back at him, expression neutral. There's a spark of gentle mockery in her eyes, though, as she says gravely, "Might be for the best, yes."

She always forgives him. Eventually.

They stop at the short length of railed wooden fence that blocks their way. There is, as she said, a stile that provides access to the rough earth path that slips between what Boyd assumes is the presbytery and the first of the more modern dwellings, but the silent challenge of the fence piques his vanity so he places a hand on the top rail and springs before he can think too much about it. The vault isn't as easy as it might have been ten or more years ago, but he clears the fence and lands on the other side with his dignity intact. A muscle in Grace's cheek twitches, as if she's resisting the urge to laugh at his childish display of athleticism. Damned good thing he managed not to pull a muscle or sprain his bloody ankle. He steps towards the stile and extends a gentlemanly hand, promptly taken as she clambers over the obstacle. He's not the only one who's not as young as they used to be.

Neglecting to release her hand, Boyd falls into step with her again. She nods towards the proliferation of little blue flowers growing in the tufty grass margins at the edges of the path. "Forget-me-nots."

"Yeah?" Such things are not his forte.

"_Myosotis sylvatica_," Grace clarifies, and for a moment he thinks she's going to subject him to a long and involved horticultural lecture, but she doesn't say anything else. He wonders if she's thinking of her neglected little back garden, of how little free time she has nowadays to enjoy it. Another thing for him to feel absurdly guilty about. His own garden is little more than a rough rectangular lawn, often left unmown for weeks at a time through the summer and ignored altogether in the winter.

They follow the natural curve of the path, pass beneath the tangled branches of a clump of mature trees, and then, almost without warning, they are out on an open, well-worn path that runs along the bank of a stream perhaps twenty feet wide, and shallow and clear enough to see the bottom, a mixture of fine silt and pebbles. Ahead in one direction Boyd can see a stone footbridge, possibly a good hundred years old or more, and in the other, the edges of a small wood from which the stream emerges as a smooth, glistening snake. Beyond the opposite bank there is a fallow field, bounded at the far end by an overgrown hedge. Agricultural land, barely a building in sight.

"Pretty," he remarks, and it is. Not the sort of place he'd want to live, but he can appreciate its unspoilt beauty.

"Yes," Grace agrees, and again she sounds faintly wistful, as if she's thinking about what she left behind all those long years ago when she was young and ambitious, and dead set on moving south to study. She points to a notch in the opposite bank where the bare earth slopes shallowly towards the water. "We used to sit over there. The boys would fish, and I'd read."

"C.S. Lewis?" Boyd suggests. It's an educated guess. He's seen modern editions of the classic children's books on the cluttered shelves in her house, nestling among thick academic tomes, general reference books, acknowledged literary classics, and popular cheap fiction. As in everything else, her taste in reading is eclectic.

"Yes," she says, no trace of surprise in her voice. "I absolutely loved the Narnia books."

"Biggles," he muses aloud, watching the way the afternoon sun makes dancing patterns on the surface of the flowing water. "I desperately wanted to be a pilot when I was a kid."

Her eyebrows rise in surprise. "Really?"

Boyd nods, recalling half-forgotten childhood dreams. "Mmhm. Seemed like… I don't know. Freedom, I suppose."

"Freedom," Grace murmurs, but though she looks suddenly troubled she doesn't say anything else. Releasing his hand, she starts back into movement, and he automatically follows, letting her choose the direction they walk in. They go towards the bridge, the silence between them new, but unremarkable and not at all confrontational.

They stop in the middle of the arched stone structure, looking down at the sparkling water passing below them. Somewhere not too far away a wood pigeon is calling again, but aside from that and the slight rustle of wind in trees that are just beginning to come into leaf, there's very little in the way of background sound. Boyd, very much a creature of the city, finds the absence of noise unsettling, but doesn't admit as much. He puts both hands on the rough stone parapet and peers over into the shallow depths of the stream, still a little amazed by just how clear the water is.

"Freedom," Grace says again, and this time there really is an edge of something in her voice. When he gives her a quizzical look in response, she sighs. "Look, I don't know how else to say this, Boyd, so I'll come straight out with it… This… thing… between us… I don't think it's working."

The unexpected words hit him hard, and without thinking about it he jerks upright as if scalded. Staring at her in bewilderment and consternation, he hears himself say, "What?"

There's quiet determination in the way she looks straight back at him. No anger, no resentment, just calm resolve. "I'm sorry."

Something in Boyd's chest is tightening rapidly, and there's a horrible free-falling sensation in the pit of his stomach. He can't process the words, can't make them fit into a sensible pattern. He continues to stare at her, his thoughts spinning in an ever-increasing whirl that makes him feel slightly nauseous. The best he can manage is a bemused, "Grace…?"

"You're a good man," she says, the words delivered with slow precision, "a much better man than you think you are. It's not – "

"Oh, don't you bloody _dare_," Boyd interrupts, a fierce spike of raw temper breaking through his stunned incredulity. "Don't you _dare_ try to give me the 'it's not you, it's me speech'. You're not that much of a coward, so don't try to hide behind something so fucking… _trite_. What is this? Some sort of childish payback for what I said to that old witch on the bicycle?"

Grace shakes her head, the accompanying heavy sigh only implied this time. "Of course not."

"So?" he demands, angry and confused. The afternoon seems to be heading in a direction he really didn't anticipate when he willingly acceded to her quiet request to divert their route home enough to allow her to visit her father's grave. An unforeseen direction he doesn't like the look of one little bit. "Come on, Grace – do what you do best… _talk_."

"I just think…" she starts, and now there's careful hesitation in the way she speaks. "I just think we're… Oh, I don't know. Maybe we just have different expectations."

"'Different expectations'," Boyd repeats, struggling to keep his voice level, to keep a tight hold on his defensive anger. "What the hell is _that_ supposed to mean?"

Grace looks away, as if looking him in the eye has become too painful. "That we want different things from… _this_."

"'This'?" he challenges, possessed by a stubborn desire to make her spell it out for him.

"Our… out-of-work relationship." She takes a slow, deep breath. Exhales just as slowly before continuing, "We didn't ever try to talk about it, did we? We just suddenly started seeing a bit more of each other, and somehow that turned into sleeping together. We never once sat down and discussed what was happening between us. What it was, where it was going."

"Because we didn't need to," he says, shaking his head. Barely aware of doing so, he scratches at his beard, an unconscious declaration of increasing stress. "Christ, Grace, we're hardly new to this game, are we? _Either_ of us. We're both old enough and wise enough to know how this sort of thing works without holding a bloody seminar about it."

The words provoke a cold glare. "I know _that_. You don't have to be quite so patronising."

"Oh, I'm not," Boyd mutters. He emulates her, taking a deep, steadying breath and letting it out slowly. "All right, I'm listening. What's this all about? I thought we were getting along fine."

"We were," Grace says, turning up the collar of her coat against the chilly breeze tracing the path of the stream. "We _are_. I'm not saying that we're incompatible – "

"Good," he interrupts, "because I can think of at least one area where we're _extremely_ compatible."

"There you are," she says swiftly. "You've just proved my point."

Again, it becomes a real battle to keep his notoriously volatile temper under control. "_What_ point?"

"Different perspectives," she replies. She's quiet for a moment, as if considering her words, then she carries on, "It's nothing to do with today. I've been thinking about it on and off for the last week or so, at least. I like you, Boyd, I like you a _lot_… and that's a big part of the problem, really."

"I'm lost," he says, and he really is. Can't make any sense of what she's almost, but not quite saying. "You're going to have to give it to me straight, Grace, because I have no bloody clue what you're really trying to tell me here."

She stares at him for a moment, then turns to lean back against the parapet, folding her arms across her chest. "Why did you ask me out to dinner? That first night, when you took me to _La Chambre Rouge_?"

He gives her a simple, prompt answer. "Because I wanted to."

"Not good enough."

"All right." Boyd pauses, tries to think of a way to explain that she will at least half believe. "I suppose after all that business with Hoyle and… you know – "

"Harry," she supplies for him. "It's all right, Boyd, you can say his name."

"After all that," he continues, refusing to do so, "I think things just started to clarify themselves. I don't go in unarmed and unprotected to face down lunatics with shotguns for just anyone, Grace."

"Actually, that's exactly what you _do_ do… but I take your point."

Not sure he wants to know the answer, he pushes his hands back into his coat pockets and asks, "So, what are you saying? You don't want us to… be together… anymore?"

"I don't know," Grace tells him, and there is genuine anguish in her expression. "Being with you… is everything I thought it would be, and more. The trouble is… well, to be frank, the trouble is the whole thing feels very… unequal."

He frowns. "Eh?"

"It frightens me, Boyd. _You_ frighten me."

"_I_ do?" The notion is incomprehensible. "Why on earth…?"

"I know what you're like," Grace says, her voice soft, not much above a whisper. "You're… restless. Capricious. What you think you want one minute can be completely different the next, and that… that's difficult to cope with when what's at stake is… personal. I don't want to be just another one of your whims. Something… some_one_… you walk away from in a heartbeat because you've suddenly changed your mind about what you want."

"Christ," he barks, staring at her in a mix of shock and outrage, "is that all you think the last month or more has been for me? A whim?"

If she could step back, he's certain she would, but the parapet is behind her preventing any retreat. Instead she flinches – quickly masked, but he sees it. Oh yes. Her tone less certain, she says, "I don't know, Boyd. That's the problem… I simply don't know. You've never given me a single hint about how you see our future together – or even if you think we _have_ a future together." She pauses, and when he says nothing she continues, "I think… I _hope_ you know me well enough to know that I have absolutely no interest in putting pressure on you to do or say anything you don't want to do. Freedom, Boyd. That's what this is about… _your_ freedom to do as you please, and _mine_ to walk away before I get hurt."

Part of him is beginning to understand, at least a little. Yes, she's a few years older than he is, but both of their characters were at least partially shaped by the exciting, turbulent decade of their adolescence and early adulthood. The late 'sixties and early 'seventies, the years of protest, rebellion and, yes, all kinds of freedom. A startlingly clear memory momentarily rocks him – himself at sixteen, seventeen, sitting barefoot in the dappled shade of a big tree somewhere in Hyde Park, a warm summer breeze ruffling hair left much longer than it had ever been before or since, a slim, smiling girl in a very short skirt curled up with him, her head resting on his thigh. An unruly, quick-tempered young man who had few thoughts for the future in his head save for a vague plan to escape from the restrictive expectations of his family and see something of the world.

It doesn't seem possible that just five or six years later that same young man would be at Hendon, clean-shaven, crewcut and wearing the very uniform he'd once languidly professed to despise.

And where was Grace in those long-ago days? Still at university, still attending the kind of intense, politically-charged parties where the heavy smell of marijuana was almost more prominent than the ear-splitting volume of the progressive music playing? Still dreaming of a future where she could, and _would_, change the world?

There's gentle resignation in the way she's watching him, as if she's waiting for the terrifying firestorm she absolutely believes he's going to unleash on her.

Slowly, very slowly, Boyd shakes his head. "You're wrong."

"Am I?"

"You are," he tells her without any fear or anger. A dull headache has started to grumble behind his eyes, but otherwise he's surprisingly calm. "You can walk away, Grace, I won't stop you… but if you do, it'll be a decision based on nothing more than unproven assumptions you've made about me, about _us_."

"Explain," she says, and he's certain, just for a moment, that her eyes are much brighter than they should be. Unshed tears, maybe? He can't quite tell.

"You're not my type," he says, the staggering bluntness of the outrageous declaration deliberate, "and I'm not yours, either. We're not with each other because it's easy, Grace, we're with each other because for some inexplicable reason we _want_ to be."

A tiny, reluctant half-smile flickers for a moment before disappearing. "That's remarkably insightful of you, Boyd."

"I have my moments," he says dryly. The lounging young man in Hyde Park with his whole future ahead of him is long gone. If he ever really existed at all. "I've had enough of women playing me for a fool. Go, if you want to. I'm not going to make false promises to make you stay. But…" he doesn't finish the sentence. Waits for her to lose patience.

She does. "'But'?"

"But," Boyd repeats, "if you think I've risked everything up to and including our entire working relationship just on a whim, you don't know me half as well as you think you bloody do."

"I'm not the only forensic psychologist in London," she says, evidently well-able to identify the words left unspoken. "I'm not even the only forensic psychologist in London with a particular specialism in offender profiling."

"No," he agrees, ready to counter the argument, "but you're the only one with a good enough track record to convince me that your methods and theories are even halfway credible."

"Thank you," Grace says, turning to face the oncoming water again, "I think."

He moves to stand next to her, their elbows not quite touching as they lean on the stonework and look down into the stream. He waits for her to speak again, and when she doesn't, he says, "Don't make me regret the huge gamble I took, Grace."

"Hiring me?"

"Seducing you."

She turns her head to regard him, the afternoon sun catching those remarkable blue eyes and making them shine like sapphires. "Oh, is that what you did?"

Maybe it's going to be all right. "Broadly speaking."

"I could say the same, you know," she says, still holding his gaze. "Letting you past the front door, let alone the _bedroom_ door, wasn't exactly risk-free for me, either."

He manages not to wince, well-aware of what she's implying. He grunts, says, "You know as well as I do that all those stories about me as some kind of arch philanderer who spent his entire married life having illicit affair after illicit affair are complete bollocks."

To his hidden relief, Grace nods. "I do. You're the living embodiment of 'serial monogamist', Boyd."

He decides not to take the words as an insult. "Well, then."

Reaching out to pick absently at a colourful patch of lichen on the parapet, Grace says, "It's the word 'serial' in that description that worries me. Serial killers don't just stop, and neither do serial monogamists."

"Serial killers can _be_ stopped. Ditto serial monogamists. Something – or some_one_ – can intervene."

"Do you love me?" she asks, the challenging inquiry and the way it's delivered both unambiguous.

"What the hell sort of question is that?" Boyd counters, instantly on the defensive. It's too much like emotional coercion for his taste. Cornering him into expressing himself has never worked well for anyone. Ever.

Grace turns to look at him properly, the hand picking at the lichen withdrawing. There's a tiny but audible metallic snap, and they both glance towards the source just in time to see the segmented metal bracelet of her watch detach itself from the slim rectangular body of the timepiece itself. They both make a vain grab for it in the same instant, but gravity is inexorable – and faster – and the unsecured watch plummets down towards the water, glittering in the sunlight as it goes. It causes a small splash, glimmers for a moment longer, then sinks out of sight, burying itself in the silt.

"Shit," Boyd mutters, as Grace voices a distressed protest. He peers fixedly over the parapet, but can see no trace of the watch despite the relative shallowness of the water.

"My mother gave me that watch," she says, her voice sounding flat and hollow, close to tears. "Twenty-first birthday present."

Boyd does what he always does. He acts on instinct. He's already half out of his long, restrictive coat as he reaches the far end of the footbridge, and as he rounds the squat stone pillar there, he shrugs out of it completely, throwing it over the stone parapet as he heads down the surprisingly steep stretch of bank beside the bridge. He's peeling his jacket off, too, when her voice from above him calls, "Boyd, don't. Leave it, it doesn't matter."

He glances up for just a brief second, long enough to see and interpret the look on her face. Panic, concern, and the tiniest flash of hope. Maybe it's that small glimmer that convinces him he's doing exactly the right thing as he drops his jacket onto the straggly grass, kicks his shoes off and stoops to remove his socks and roll up the legs of his suit trousers. He's into the water – shockingly cold – before he looks up again and orders, "Guide me."

"Idiot," Grace scolds, and he thinks she really might be crying now. "Head for the middle of the stream."

He does. The water's far colder than he expected, and his feet sink a little in the silt and stones. Rough edges drive into soft flesh making him wince, and the previously clear water becomes cloudier with every step he takes. When he stops at what he thinks is approximately the right place, the water is just below his knees. He can feel the tug of the current, not strong, but distinct. He looks up again. "Where?"

"A couple of feet to your left," Grace instructs, and there's a choked thickness to her voice that suggests she's struggling very hard against a strong flood of emotion. "Are you okay? Is it cold?"

"Fucking freezing," he growls, making the directed adjustment to his position. "Here?"

"About there, yes."

Boyd unfastens his cufflinks, removes them and puts them safely in the buttoned rear pocket of his trousers. Twenty-two carat gold, a leaving present from the serious crime investigation team he'd led in the final years leading up to the establishment of the Cold Case Unit. Rolling up his shirtsleeves, he stoops and plunges a hand and forearm into the chilly water. He doesn't feel the bottom of the stream until his elbow's submerged and the rolled portion of the sleeve is soaked.

"Anything?" Grace calls, that thin note of hope back in her voice.

"Not yet," he informs her, running his fingers back and forth through the silt. It has a slightly gritty texture, and now and again his fingertips encounter stones, some smoothed by years of immersion, some still more jagged-edged. He looks up at her again. "Is this about where it hit the water?"

"Yes," she confirms, sounding sure. "Somewhere there."

The watch isn't big, but it _is_ metal. Gold-plated silver, he thinks, sure that he's noticed a distinct pattern of wear on its surface when he's seen it lying on the bedside table next to her bed. Or his. Metal, anyway. Too heavy to have gone far. How far might the current have taken it before the silt bogged it down? Six inches? A foot? More? Less? He doesn't know.

Boyd slows the speed of the combing passes he's making through the silt with his extended fingers. _People_ make him impatient, inanimate objects less so. The watch is here, he just needs to keep doggedly searching until he finds it. It's like looking for the truth in an investigation a dozen years old or more. Just determinedly keep going in careful, logical patterns until you find what you're looking for. It's about being stubborn enough to push through the treacherous instinct to give up, that's all. Exactly why he was the first and only real choice to command the CCU when someone's bright idea found some funding and started to become a reality.

"Boyd?" Grace's voice once more, still above him. "Boyd, it's fine. Leave it. Come out of there before you catch your death."

"No," he says. "It's here somewhere."

"Idiot," she repeats, her voice wrapped in admiration and despair.

Keeping his gaze on the swirling eddies of silt clouding the water, Boyd growls, "Idiot who cares about you a damn sight more than you give him bloody credit for."

"Peter."

The rare, almost unheard-of use of his first name makes him look up again. Grace is looking down at him with solemn dignity, and it's reflected in her voice as she says, "No-one can predict the future, but – "

"_Fuck_," he yelps, interrupting her words as something incredibly sharp slices cleanly across his questing fingers causing a moment of searing pain, quickly numbed by the biting cold of the stream. The cloudy, muddy water around him takes on a rapidly-increasing burgundy hue, and as Boyd snatches back his hand and stands bolt upright there's a sudden and momentarily frightening gush of blood. It streams down his wet hand and wrist, streaks along his forearm, and drips, diluted, into the stream.

From the bridge there's a loud and heartfelt, "Oh, my God…"

There's a straight laceration across the pads of three out of four of his fingers, each individual cut quickly obscured by the copious amount of dark blood pouring forth. Boyd clamps his uninjured left hand hard around his right, putting as much pressure as he can tolerate on the wounds as he raises his arm. His whole right hand is throbbing, and for a moment he grits his teeth against the unwelcome level of pain.

"Boyd?" Grace again. "Boyd. What happened? How bad…?"

"Glass, I think," he tells her, coming back to himself a little. The cuts are bad, but he's suffered far worse. "Broken bottle, maybe. Must've been buried in the silt."

"Hang on," she calls, "I'll come down to you."

He shakes his head. "Stay there. It's not as bad as it looks."

"Boyd, you're pouring blood!"

"Not anymore, I'm not," he tells her, accurately, keeping the injured hand clamped and elevated. "There's a First Aid kit in the back of the car. Keys are in my coat pocket."

"I'm not leaving you," Grace says, and he can tell by her grim expression that she means every word. She starts to unwind the thin, patterned scarf from around her neck. "Here, wrap this around it." She wads the fabric into a tight ball and drops it down to him. He nearly fumbles the catch, but just manages to save the scarf from a watery demise. Under different circumstances he might complain about the bold floral design, but with nothing better to use as a makeshift bandage he keeps his grumbling opinion to himself.

Winding the material tightly around his still bleeding hand, Boyd allows a satisfied grunt. The throbbing pain hasn't receded, but that doesn't matter. Around his shins, the current has swept away the blood and much of the stirred-up silt, and as he looks down, searching for any sign of whatever it was that sliced his fingers open so cleanly, he sees a tell-tale glint of gold, half-buried but now at least partially visible. Oh, the fucking irony. Muttering dark imprecations to himself, he stoops again, reaches down carefully with his left hand and plucks the watch from the stream bed. Standing up straight, he holds up his prize. "Never underestimate the power of sheer bloody-mindedness, Grace."

"Oh, my God," she says again, but without the previous taut note of panic, "you found it!"

"Now tell me I'm a good-for-nothing pain in the arse." He inspects the watch, then informs her, "It's stopped. Looks like you'll need to get it cleaned and repaired."

"Never mind the damned watch," Grace says, "I'm more worried about _you_. Can you get out of the water without cutting your feet?"

"I sincerely hope so. Only one way to find out."

"Be _careful_, Boyd."

He's tempted to scathingly thank her for the unnecessary advice, but he's had more than enough confrontation for one day. Holding his injured hand against his chest, he picks his way gingerly back towards the bank. By the time he steps up onto the grass, Grace is at the end of the bridge looking down at him. "All right?"

"Yeah," he confirms, sitting down on the slope. One-handed he starts to fumble with his socks, is pleasantly surprised when she joins him and starts to help without a single word. Socks on and trousers rolled back down over the icy cold skin of his lower legs, he is starting to feel a little more human again. Or, at least, a little warmer. He doesn't realise he's shivering until his teeth start to chatter. Grace gives him a sideways look, but continues to hold her peace. She helps him back on with his shoes, helps him get back to his feet and roll his sleeves down, then helps him back on with his suit jacket. Only then does he hand her back her watch. "Here. Get them to check the rest of the links in the bracelet while they're at it."

"Thank you," she says, a strangely humble note in her voice.

"My pleasure," he says, only a little sardonic.

"Let me see your hand."

"Why?" he asks suspiciously. "You might have a doctorate, Doctor, but you're not a doctor."

"Just show me," she orders.

Losing the will to argue, Boyd unwinds the blood-soaked scarf and forces his throbbing hand open. The cuts are deep, he can see, and they are still bleeding, though not as rapidly.

Taking his hand in hers, Grace shakes her head. "You're going to need stitches. There's a minor injuries place at Leigh, I think, or we can go back to Bolton. Or head for Manchester, I suppose."

None of the options appeal to Boyd. He can see that she's right, though, and proper medical attention at some point is unavoidable. Pulling his hand away from her grasp, he says, "I know a good hospital. St Mary's."

She scowls at him. "St Mary's is in Paddington, Boyd."

He nods. "Which is in London. Exactly where we're going."

"No," she says in a tone that suggests quarrelling with her about it would be very unwise. "Just for once, do the sensible, rational thing. We can go and get you stitched up, and then I can drive us home."

"You can't drive my car."

The scowl returns. "Now is not the time to be precious about it, for heaven's sake."

"I'm not," he tells her, faintly triumphant. "The car belongs to the bloody _Met_. When I say you can't drive my car, I mean you _can't_ drive my car. It's a police vehicle."

Grace frowns, clearly not sure how to go about arguing the point. "Well – "

"No," he interrupts quickly, forestalling the idea he can see forming. "I know what you're going to say, and the answer's _no_. I'm not leaving the bloody car up here and going back to London by plane, train or… whatever."

"Well, you can't _drive_."

The very last of his patience beginning to fray, Boyd growls, "It's a fucking automatic, Grace. I'll manage."

She doesn't look impressed by his heroism. "Why do you always have to be so stupidly, impossibly stubborn?"

"Who found your damn watch for you?"

Grace holds up her hands in grudging surrender. "You did."

He grunts, starts to wind the scarf back round his hand. When Grace attempts to take over, he lets her. Gazing at the top of her head, he says, "All right, all right. You win. We'll go and get it seen to. But I'm driving back to London as soon as the stitches are in. Too much bloody hassle, finding another way home, let alone leaving the car up here and then arranging to get it returned somehow."

"You could get Stella to do it. She'd love the chance to get out of the office for a bit."

"No," he insists. "I'm compromising with you here as it is, Grace."

"There's another alternative," she says, knotting the scarf firmly and tucking in the loose ends of fabric. Looking up at him, she continues, "We could find a hotel, or a guest house, or something. Stay up here tonight, then drive back tomorrow after you've given this a chance to rest for a bit."

Boyd's instincts are good, and they don't often fail him. They don't this time. Tipping his head a fraction as he studies her neutral expression, he poses the only question that interests him. "One room, or two?"

Grace looks straight back at him, utterly composed. "_One_ room, Boyd."

She's changed her mind again. Women's prerogative. Why, he's not completely sure, but perhaps the reasons don't matter. The second question is born more from devilment than anything else, and he asks it with perfectly-studied solemnity. "Twin or double?"

"What do _you_ think?" she inquires, more scathing than arch. "Do you really think I keep you around for your sunny disposition and scintillating conversation?"

He grins at her, his mood lifting despite the throbbing pain radiating along his fingers and into his bandaged hand. "Well, what on earth else would you want me for?"

Nothing in her expression changes, but there's a telling glint of amusement in her eyes as she says, "Use your imagination, Detective Superintendent."

A flash of recent memory. Smooth bare skin, soft feminine curves. Intense blue eyes, wide with desire. The taste of her, the smell of her… the look on her face as she… Oh, damnbloodyfuck…

Wounded hand completely forgotten for a moment, Boyd shifts his weight enough to bring him closer to her without actually taking a single step forward. "Oh, I am, Grace. I am."

"Good. Hold that thought." She gives him a limpid smile and deliberately moves out of reach. "Stitches first."

Grumbling under his breath, he follows her back up the sloped bank, collects his heavy coat from the parapet and shrugs into it, wincing at a renewed hot surge of pain that lances up from his fingertips. Whether to distract him, or just because she wants to clarify the situation, he doesn't know, but as she watches him, Grace says, "Are you going to ask me why I changed my mind? About us?"

Boyd shakes his head. "No."

"Well, I'll tell you anyway, shall I?" is the imperturbable response. "It's not just the big things, is it? You won't just charge down a man with a loaded gun for me, you'll go wading up to your knees in icy cold water for me… not because I ask you to, or because you feel it's somehow expected of you… in fact, you don't make any kind of conscious decision to do what you do for me, do you? You just _do it_."

He frowns, not sure if she's chastising him or not. "What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing," Grace says. "Nothing at all. It wasn't a criticism, Boyd. Far from it."

"So?"

There's simple but limitless courage in the way she replies, "So… maybe I need to practice what I preach and concentrate more on patterns of behaviour than on imaginary words that never actually get said."

"Good idea."

She directs the frostiest of frosty looks at him. "I'm doing my best to build bridges, and that's the best response you can come up with? 'Good idea'?"

Forcing himself not to smirk, Boyd says, "Grace?"

"What?"

"Stop talking."

He kisses her gently, but very thoroughly, taking his time about it. It's a very satisfactory method, he's discovered, of silencing her, and when they're not talking, they're not arguing. When he eventually draws back and looks down at her he's certain there's going to be some clever, witty riposte, but to his surprise Grace simply gives him a very small, almost shy smile, then turns on her heel and starts to walk back across the bridge, presumably heading in the direction of the car. Boyd watches her for a moment, then tucks his injured hand tight against his chest and follows her, distantly wondering what on earth it is about spirited, difficult women that has always attracted him so strongly, and whether it's far too late in life to do anything about it.

Behind him, another wood pigeon – or perhaps the same one – starts its mournful hoo-hooing again. He doesn't notice.

_\- the end -_


End file.
